Epistemic Settlements: 'partial and contingent objectivity'

Shanks and Tilley (1987a) were precisely two of Binford’s critics in their espousal of a ‘reconstructed archaeology’. These criticisms had two important epistemological implications: paradigm independence was argued to be untenable in their advocacy of a ‘strong contextualism’ on the part of archaeologists; as corollary to the inextricable embeddedness of archaeological interpretation in contemporary, socio-political ‘biases’, ideology was refigured along neo-Marxist lines as a determinant factor in past-lifeways. This second ‘reconstruction of theory’ was integral to their erasure of the past-present divide, and inverted the equation of ideology as epiphenomenal, or at least causally peripheral, to Binford’s eco-materialist ‘substructure’. Hawkes’ ladder of inference was turned on its supports, granting the ‘ideotechnic’ or symbolic realm of culture a role as a prime mover in past and contemporary society (1987a, esp. ch.7-8). As noted above, this postprocessual re-conceptualization of the domain of archaeology, of culture, and the embrace of a strong form of Kuhnian contextualism or paradigm dependence (elevated to a doubly binding status wherein both ‘data’ and ‘theory’ are determined by paradigm specificity) raised traditional epistemological worries of circularity in interpretation and a lack of criteria for evaluation of claims. For instance, they claim that “there is literally nothing independent of theory or propositions to test against”, and “the facts are thus theory-laden constructions constrained by resistances in the data” (1987a:111, emphasis original). Such brash acceptance of theory-ladeness supports, in fact, their larger program of acknowledging the use or misuse of the past for contemporary purposes; of archaeology being a political, value-informed practice which conceals historically specific beliefs in a specious ‘objectivity’. “No political position is neutral on this issue and there can be no neutral archaeology” (ibid:110). This is because, far from simply being a matter of paradigm dependence (whether of data or theory), archaeology is incapable of disassociating itself from the originary values and beliefs of larger society which generate the field itself. For Anglo-American archaeology, Shanks and Tilley identify capitalism and free-market ideals as the driving desire behind an understanding of the past. Such informing concepts of culture, such as that of Binford’s extra-somatic adaptation to the environment, are pulled from distant-near phenomena such as free-market competition, and applied in a presentist fashion to the past. This subjectivity of the contemporary archaeologist cannot be redacted out via ‘scientistic’ method and reflection, as to attempt to do so instantiates yet again values of contemporary society – that of rationality and professional distance for example. (ibid:14). “The truth in scientific archaeology’s denial of subjectivity is its reflection of the fetishized position of people in contemporary capitalism”(ibid:12). Drawing especially upon the Frankfurt School’s writings highlighting the peculiarity of technocratic society and the naturalization of values according to which such a society operates (such as rational thought and, particularly, a scientism) Shanks and Tilley take on the epistemological debates of the previous generation of archaeologists by redirecting the concern of objectivity-subjectivity and evaluation to a more encompassing, trans-disciplinary order. Theory ladeness derives not from Kuhn’s disciplinary matrices but from more fundamental and pervasive sources: from society at large. To turn the phrase, society is paradigm dependent; only these ‘paradigms’ are more pernicious as they are obfuscated both by their long historical development and the integral ideology which reifies them.

Particularly in their remarks against positivism and the general ‘scientistic attitude’, they in fact question the utility of epistemology as traditionally conceived. “Positivist/empiricist discourse is a closed philosophy. By this is meant that it supposes that there is only one correct and proper manner of approaching, describing and explaining reality” (ibid:103). Instead, they forward the “development of a hermeneutic, reflexive, dialectical and critical non-empiricist philosophy of archaeology”(ibid:114).

The question becomes, then, if knowledge claims are made for the past under such a program, how are they to be evaluated? Shanks and Tilley were not unaware of the question (eg. 1992:248-52) but see such a need for evaluation as deriving from the idea of a single, correct ‘way it was’ and presupposing cultural and scientific values, such as those mentioned already (parsimony, coherence, correspondence), which are in some sense arbitrary rather than absolute standards. Their identification of such values with a class politics generated by the encompassing economic framework of advanced capitalism leaves archaeologists without foundational premises for judgment or evaluation (1987b:198). Such a position offers many possibilities for working on the past and presenting innovative research without the presumption of non-culturally specific standards backing-up the resultant claims. Significantly, their “honest view” of archaeological evaluation stresses, in the absence of ‘objective’ standards such as in the account of Binford’s, a “communicative epistemology” (1992:67,261) where consensus is achieved by inter-subjective agreement amongst an expanded range of participants. This radical pluralism, or democratic politics for archaeology, is to reformulate not only standards of participation but, crucially, extend such inclusive participation to the stage of evaluation. As they state, such a democratic epistemology for assessing claims to the past is a practical matter in the present, which must “make the values we bring to research explicit and subject the values to critical scrutiny” (1992:67). Such an attitude to archaeological research and evaluation is brought out in contrast to their position against ‘correspondence theories’ of truth. “Knowledge is not produced by passively receiving individuals acting somehow as mirrors to the world but by interacting social groups evaluating what is to count as knowledge communally” (ibid.:66). And in their dialogue with Renfrew (1989:40), who explicitly supports a correspondence basis for epistemology, their critique of this ‘value’ as being particular to scientific ideals and insufficiently reflexive in its attempt to mirror the past is a convincing example of their ‘critical archaeology’ (Shanks and Tilley 1989:4). In respect to the ethics of contemporary global heritage Chapter 1 and the general, historical assumption of correspondence theories in archaeology Chapter 2 their reconfiguring of practice and evaluation offer lines of reasoning which anticipate much of the current dilemma in archaeology and provide the starting point for this project.

However, while sketched abstractly, their insightful statements advocating democratic inquiry and criticisms of correspondence theory as a basis for evaluation need to be expanded in order to adequately meet the worries of accountability and relativism. These worries were immediately raised by the commentators in the Norwegian Archaeological Review forum. As was stressed, there seems to be the need for an accountability or else there looms the possibility of ‘anything goes’ or the ‘past as wished for’ in archaeological practice (Renfrew 1989:36). The question revolves around the need for legitimizing, if not in the capital ‘T’ qualification of truth, accounts offered up by archaeologists, especially those individuals interested in scientific accreditation and critical theory in archaeology, or the possibility of therapy-work for archaeology long the lines presented by Shanks and Tilley. That is, without some measure of trans-personal validity to claims made of the past or in criticism of contemporary archaeological thought and practice, such admonitions remain anecdotal and abdicate their potential for correcting oversights, faulty assumptions, or unsubstantiated validation due to informing ideological concerns. Leone and Shackel (eg. 1987), proposing a related form of ‘critical theory’, cleave to the notion of ‘objectivity’ for just such reasons. Otherwise, a critical archaeology remains only suggestive in its admonitions, or even self-defeating as relativist.

In response to the charges of relativism, Shanks and Tilley propose a ‘particular and contingent objectivity’ (1989:43) Figure 3.2. Their contention is that while material culture is polysemous in nature, the writing of accounts “is a process involving both resistance (the material record does constrain what we can write in various ways) and transformation (the movement from things to words)” (ibid:4).

Figure 3.2: relationship between ‘artifacts and texts’ (from Shanks and Tilley 1989:5)

Proposing “network of resistances” (ibid.:43) which materiality imposes upon possible interpretations seems to offer an escape from viscous circularity in evaluation. As opposed to ‘anything goes’ in accounts of the past, Shanks and Tilley affirm that materiality constrains what can be said. Materiality cannot be transformed into just any textual statement. Rather, in the process of crossing the gap from material to archaeological text, prior theoretical constructs are modified, dropped or transformed as “data resistances” are progressively accommodated (ibid:44). This ‘spiraling technique’ has much in common with the hermeneutic question-and-answer procedure described by Hodder (below); and it also tacitly implies a testing of prior theory against the encountered data which is described by Wylie (below) as essential to the independence of subject-side from domain-side which affords her ‘mitigated objectivity’. However, in responding to their critics in Norwegian Archaeological Review, Shanks and Tilley seem to downplay their previous commitment to pluralism and democratic inquiry in favor of an abstract notion of ‘data resistance’. As discussed in Chapter 1, the inclusion of non-Western frameworks for understanding the past often results in incommensurable or incompatible claims regarding the same material. The notion of ‘data resistance’, in that not just anything can be said of material culture, leaves two difficulties: either it is left so vague as an assertion that it encompasses any statement of the past, including, for instance, mythological and/or oral history statements by Native American groups involved in NAGPRA procedures, that it offers no defense against the charges of relativistic pluralism; or, contrary to their desire of incorporating a plurality of social groups in inquiry, it equally assumes a standard of what constitutes ‘resistance’ which would fall under their criticism of non-universal (i.e. Western, scientific) values. The problem is simply that either the manner in which materiality constrains what can be said must be further expanded upon to see if it indeed avails itself of universal applicability, or it must remain a very general statement, incapable by itself of assurance against charges of relativism. As a profitable suggestion, the first approach will be explored later under the idea of mediation in the fine-grained analysis of practice in science studies. As their argument against relativity stands, however, there remains little assurance that the need for some criteria for evaluation has been satisfied.

Forward to Epistemic Settlements: 'guarded objectivity'

Containments

Return to Epistemic Settlements: 'relative objectivity'